Make your baby look like the Thirteenth Doctor

It's not every day that your massive Doctor Who addict friends have their first child (who conveniently ended up being female). It's not every day that the BBC announces that the Thirteenth Doctor will be female, played by Jodie Whittaker. It's not every day you realise that these two events need to be married together and that you need to make sure that (when the time is right) your friends can dress their daughter up like Doctor Who.

So I made a baby outfit.

This is sized approximately for 6-12m in the hope that it will be the right size when the new series airs later this year. It's also sized for 6-12m because I have a very poor concept of how big/small babies actually are and this felt like a safe bet.

I had this idea way back in November 2017 and no sooner had it popped into my brain than Zenith & Quasar had announced that they would be stocking some custom print ABP in the style of the Doctor's costume. I quickly joined the preorder for some t-shirt fabric. The rest would be pretty easy to find in London. The Z&Q fabric took TWO MONTHS to arrive at my doorstep. Two frustrating months! It got lagged with pre-order lead time, Christmas, customs and stuff of that nature in the way. I was so relieved when the package finally arrived.

Supplies:

Coat: Stash fabric and bought fabric from London. The rainbow trim is actually from a pair of Stonewall shoelaces!
Tee: Z&Q
Shorts: Stash fabric. The yellow braces came from my stash of plush elastic.
Socks: RTW
Boots: RTW

Patterns used:

Burdastyle 09/2013 #143 Quilted Baby Coat
Burdastyle 09/2013 #146 Baby's Ruffle Blouse
Oliver & S Sunny Day Shorts

The shorts were lengthened slightly, and I added some attachments for the braces but otherwise it was made as drafted. The blouse and the coat both had some significant modifications. The coat was modified to match the costume. The t-shirt was modified to match the RTW style of overlapping shoulders (instead of the closure at the centre back).

I also entered in the the PR Match Your Shoes contest. It was pure coincidence that the timings lined up, so I thought this would be a fun tiny outfit. If you want more technical detail, I give more in my reviews over on sewingpatternreview. Otherwise, feel free to ask.

K

The Road to Sidmouth (part 4): The Food Edition

I've got about 5 drafts queued up/nearly ready to go, so excuse the potential deluge...

You read earlier that we got a Jetboil and decided to embrace dehydrated meals. You saw earlier some cosies for our little mealboxes. Now you will see the fabulous borrowed dehydrator making its presence known on top of my sewing cupboard:

And all over my sewing space:

With hindsight I think I may have over-prepared our food for Sidmouth. While we did follow an ultralight dehydrated food method, it was too much food, and when all the meals added up I wasn’t really able to carry the weight of my own bag. In total I prepped breakfast, lunch and dinner for 2 people for a full week. And, naturally, I made massive portions. And then insisted we pre-buy all of the snacks.

In general it was a success, though some meals didn't turn out as good as others. I guess that's not uncommon, but we got exceedingly lucky considering the whole method was new and I invented most of the recipes. The runaway recipe winner was my Upside-down Fish Pie, although the chickpea curry and Jetboil couscous were also really good. So, for the benefit of maker-kind, here’s the recipe:

Ultimate Dehydrated Upside-down Fish Pie for camping, hiking and fast cooking.

Serves 2 generously

You will need:
Boiling water
Cooking pot or cosy

Ingredients:
A handful of dehydrated vegetables (I mixed carrots, peas and sweetcorn, and measured about ¾ of an American cup measure per person)
2 tbsp powdered full-fat milk (e.g. Nido)
1x sachet of Coleman’s Cheese Sauce (or any other sachet of cheese sauce with a respectable level of cheese content)
60g Smash instant mashed potato
Pinch of black pepper
2x60g cans of no-drain tuna
1x can of anchovies in oil

Method:
Before Your Trip

• Assemble the meal by putting the dehydrated vegetables into 1 zip-lock bag, and by combining the powdered ingredients + black pepper (to taste) into another zip lock bag.
• Store the bags and cans of fish together in an airtight container until ready to use

At Camp

• Boil some water and pour the veg into your cooking pot/cosy. Stir in a small amount of hot water, just enough to cover the veg, to rehydrate. Cover with a lid and leave to sit for a few minutes.
• Tip the sauce sachet into your cooking pot/cosy and stir, gradually adding more water until you reach a potato-y fluffy consistency. Cover again and leave to sit for a few mins.
• Fluff up the tuna in its can and add to the pot/cosy. Stir.
• Divide the anchovies between serving and pour in a little of the oil to loosen the mixture if desired
• Serve.

Well, there you go, enjoy!
K